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                                                  College of Liberal Arts 

CoLA Color


 

CoLA Weekly

 

Friday, January 23, 2015  

 

I want to open by sending a huge THANK YOU to all of the faculty and staff who have been working hard on Program Reviews! This was a huge effort across the college and took a lot of time and energy on the part of many. Just imagine all the work we can get done now that the Program Reviews are completed.

 

The Program Reviews will be an important part of our application for accreditation by the Higher Learning Commission (HLC). Since Fall 2013, a large committee of over 60 people has been preparing our Assurance Report, data, and materials for submission for accreditation. Please join me in thanking the following CoLA faculty, staff, and students for their countless hours and selfless sacrifice on behalf of the university:

 


Criterion 1: Dawn Banker, CoLA

                     Jennifer Subban, Urban Affairs

Criterion 2: Carol Loranger, Co-chair, English

                     Enam Choudhury, Urban Affairs

Criterion 3: Kristin Sobolik, Co-chair, CoLA

                     Jennifer Subban, Urban Affairs

                     Hope Jennings, English

                     Carolyn Stoermer, English

Criterion 4: Barry Milligan, English

Criterion 5: Paul Lockhart, History

Federal Compliance: Opolot Okia, History

Student Reps: Kyle Powell, Political Science

                          Sukhman Singh, Political Science

Assurance of Learning Committee: Herb Dregalla, CoLA

                                                              Mary Rucker, Communication

 

The Assurance Report draft will be released to campus on September 25, 2015 and the HLC Team will visit campus March 21-22, 2016.

   

Outstanding social media in CoLA is a high priority.   It allows us to engage with current and prospective students in real time, keep our targeted audience informed, and create a sense of community within our student body. This past semester we had an outstanding student, Bridget Fantaci, Communication, managing the college's social media. She was able to use the knowledge she gained from Ike Brunner's, Communication, Social Media and Personal Branding class to help shape the future of social media within CoLA. Bridget graduated in December and immediately began her  career at Reynolds and Reynolds as a Digital Marketing Specialist. We would like to thank Bridget for all her outstanding work and wish her luck out in the real world! With Bridget's departure, we welcome aboard another of Ike Bruner's outstanding students, Cassi Boyer. Cassi is a Mass Communication major from Baltimore, Maryland whose future plans include getting a job in mass communication while attending law school.  She will make a fine addition to our team - Welcome Cassi!

 

 Did you know that Nicole Scherzinger once strolled the tunnels of Wright State's campus? Known for her strong soprano vocals, Nicole has received critical acclaim by performing songs in onstage performances from musicals such as Rocky Horror Picture Show, Evita, Phantom of the Opera, Rent, and Cats. Throughout a career spanning 13 years, she has sold 16 million records as a solo artist and a further 54 million with Pussycat Dolls. Nicole studied Musical Theatre at Wright State, performing as Velma in CHICAGO and Julie LaVerne in SHOW BOAT during her time here. Just a couple of weeks ago, President Hopkins, Stuart McDowell, Theatre, and Joe Deer, Theatre, had the opportunity to see Nicole perform as Grizabella in CATS before a sold-out audience at London's Palladium, where she sang a fabulous "Memory" before 2,300 people. What a great photo to capture Nicole reminiscing with her professors about the good ole days at Wright State!  

 

I want to recognize some important mentoring work that was initiated last fall by CoLA faculty members Shreya Bhandari, Social Work, and Amelia Hubbard, Anthropology.  Shreya and Amelia composed a grant aimed at developing mentoring for women faculty in STEMMS fields (the last "M" is medicine and the last "S" is Social and Behavioral Science). The idea focused on informal but structured group mentoring rather than a traditional mentor-mentee model. Learn more about this mentoring initiative and how it helped improve climate in an article published recently in the American Society for Cell Biology (beginning on page 10): Building Groups to Help Women Survive and Succeed.

 

This model has worked well so far, and I hope that others will seek out similar frameworks for mentoring and will consider applying for the Second Annual WSU Faculty Mentoring Grants Program. Priority will be given to activities that address the needs of broader groups of faculty and that tie directly to specific mentoring challenges on our campus. Proposals are due no later than February 9.

 

I hope you will join us for the Second Annual CoLA Authors' Reception next Monday, January 26, 4:00-5:30 p.m. in the Robert and Elaine Stein Galleries. I look forward to celebrating our 13 faculty who published a book or CD in 2014.

 

  • Liam Anderson, Political Science, An Atlas of Middle Eastern Affairs and Federal Solutions to Ethnic Problems: Accommodating
  • Erik C. Banks, Philosophy, The Realistic Empiricism of Mach, James, and Russell: Neutral Monism Reconceived
  • Rich Bullock, English, The Little Seagull Handbook
  • Frank Cox, Music, Substance and Content in Music Today and The New Cello, Vol 2: European Composers
  • Shelley Jagow, Music, Intermediate Studies for Developing Artists on the BASSOON, Intermediate Studies for Developing Artists on the FLUTE, and Intermediate Studies for Developing Artists on the OBOE.
  • Sharon Lynette Jones, English, Critical Insights: Zora Neale Hurston
  • Myron A. Levine, Urban Affairs and Geography, Annual Editions: Urban Society
  • Kathryn Meyer, History, Life and Death in the Garden: Sex, Drugs, Cops and Robbers in Wartime China 
  • David Petreman, Modern Languages, El T�mpano de Coloane
  • Vaughn Shannon, Political Science, Cases in International Relations: Pathways to Conflict and Cooperation 
  • Damaris Serrano, Modern Languages, Panam�: (re)cuentos de la naci�n en di�spora. Panam�: Editorial Mariano Arosemena (Colecci�n Premio Ricardo Mir� Ensayo)
  • Drew Swanson, History, A Golden Weed: Tobacco and Environment in the Piedmont South 
  • Yuliya Walsh, Modern Languages, Forms of Address in Contemporary Ukrainian Newspapers/ Morphology, Gender and Pragmatics

 


This week's featured New Faculty is Pascale Abadie. Pascale was born in Paris, France and moved to  Dayton 22 years ago. She earned her associate's degree in Business from Sinclair Community College and then transferred to Wright State where she earned her bachelor's degree in French and Business and her master's degree in Education.  She recently earned her PhD in French and Francophone Studies with a concentration in African Women Literature at the University of Cincinnati. Pascale loves Wright State students because they are hard-working and many are first generation.  She loves the Department of Modern Languages because her colleagues are always open to new ideas and ways to interest students. Pascale is a valued member of the CoLA team!

Next Friday we will take a break from the CoLA Weekly to focus our attention on the Winter Edition of the CoLA Newsletter that is emailed tri-annually to over 20,000 people. We have prepared a wide variety of stories that highlight our fantastic faculty, staff, retirees, students, alumni, and friends - I hope you enjoy!
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Kristin Sobolik
Dean